O+ 360 Alpha Plus Price, Specs, Unboxing, O+ Innovations and Features

Last week, our dear friends from O+ USA sent me a unit of their latest midrange 360 Series Android smartphone along with a letter explaining its key features as well as its discounted pricing information via the company's anniversary sale.

Thanks for trusting TechPinas, O+ USA!

The O+ 360 Alpha Plus is the affordable selfie-centric Android smartphone that I told you about a few days ago. This is the first release from O+ to feature their all-new Selfie Fix camera plug-in, which comes with a number of tools and algorithms to instantly improve your self-portraits.

Being the newest member of O+'s best-selling 360 Series of handsets, the Alpha Plus sports a touch-sensitive patch on its removable back cover. It works like a trackpad and you can use it to navigate the phone's home-screens and to browse supported applications.

Aside from 360 Touch Technology and Selfie Fix, Alpha Plus also comes with a number of other O+ Innovations including the classic Air Shuffle, Peace to Selfie, Doodle Control, and Visitor Mode. I've already explained these features in my previous TP posts and TV appearances -- but I'll talk more about some of them after we do this quick unboxing.

This is O+'s standard Red Box with "Pull-Out" Inner Container for its 360 Series smartphones.

Just like all other O+ midrange and flagship-level smartphones, the Alpha Plus - right out of the box - has this on-screen sticker that protects the display during shipment. It also shows you the phone's key features and technical specs with one glance.

The sticker on the back cover details the capabilities of the 360 Touch Sensitive Panel. You can swipe on it up and down or side to side to navigate the home screen and some apps including Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. You may also long press on it to launch applications and to take photos.

The phone has two cameras: The one at the back, above the 360 Touch patch, is a 5 MegaPixel autofocus shooter with BSI sensor and LED flash and the one in front - for taking selfies - is a 5MP cam with soft LED flash that lets you snap shots even in low to zero lighting conditions.

The phone has a very simple, subdued design identity that users who don't like unnecessary design accents and embellishment would appreciate.

Check out the rounded corners and the matte texture of the back plate.

Both the volume rocker and the power button are located on the right panel for easy access using your thumb if you're right-handed or your index and pointer finger if you're left-handed.

Both the microUSB port and the 3.5 mm audio jack can be found on the top panel.

Let's take a look at the other items that are included in the package.

And they all have individual containers. Neat!

That's quite a lot. Let's check them out one by one.

Use the microUSB to USB connector cable to charge the phone and to connect it to a computer.

Again, if you have time, read the user manual.

Standard earphones with in-ear silicone buds. And you get two extra pairs of buds in Large and Small sizes.

The travel charger has folding prongs so you don't have to worry about the metal part scratching your other gadgets when you throw it in your bag.

This is the company's new Selfie Fix app, which works like a plug-in within the default camera application. You can use this app to automatically even-out your skintone or add make-up virtually when snapping selfies, making them instantly ready for sharing on Facebook or Instagram. This also incorporates O+'s Peace to Selfie Innovation that prompts the camera app to take a photo when it detects the subject doing the peace sign. In the coming days, I'll be showing you how this plug-in works via separate TP posts and videos.

Under the hood, O+ 360 Alpha Plus is powered by a MediaTek MT6582 chipset that incorporates four ARM Cortex A7 cores clocked at 1.3 GHz and a 500 MHz Mali-400 MP2 graphics chip.

That moderately powerful SoC is complemented by 1GB of RAM for multitasking and 8GB of ROM that you can augment using the microSD card expansion slot.

O+ 360 Alpha Plus gets an Antutu Benchmark Test Score in the range of 20,000 to 21,000. I got 20,041 when I ran the app on the phone as part of our initial impressions feature.

You can control the functionality of the 360 Touch patch via the phone's Settings. You may opt to turn off this feature altogether or to use it as way to unlock the phone, to scroll through apps, to launch a specific application or to take photos using both the front and back cameras.

And you can do the same thing with Doodle Control, which is an O+ Innovation that lets you perform gestures on the touchscreen even when its turned off to make commands or to launch applications.

With Doodle Control you can fire up the screen simply by double tapping on it or to quickly launch the camera by writing "C" on the inactive display, among many others.

The Air Shuffle controls are found in the phone's Accessibility settings. Again, Air Shuffle allows you to take photos, browse images, or play music tracks simply by waving your hand on top of the phone's display, right above the ambient light sensor.

O+ 360 Alpha Plus is now available at all O+ Concept Stores, kiosks, and partner retail outlets across the country. Its official suggested retail price is Php 4,995 but you can get for Php 1,000 less - bringing the price tag down to just Php 3,995 - if you're going to purchase it now until August 31, 2015. In line with the company's anniversary celebration, this major discount is one of O+ USA's surprise treats for its loyal fans and followers.

Is this handset right for you? Get O+ 360 Alpha Plus if you're looking for a very affordable and pocket-friendly Android smartphone that has a great pair of cameras, a good set of internal hardware for its price, and a slew of unique software enhancements providing a more fun and intuitive user experience.